It's nice to be home.

Well we're back from the family reunion. It is SO NICE to FINALLY be home. We were in WA/ID for a total of 11 days. Too long of a trip with a 5 month old. The 3 of us had fun at the family reunion, but all in all it was more exhausting. Cache's 1st tooth is cutting through. Cache was cranky/fussy pretty much the whole trip. (Still is!) Understandably, considering he is teething and with everything going on it was hard to keep his schedule and routine up. On top of that, we all caught colds from the family reunion. (I also think from the cold, windy boat trip across Lake Pend Oreille.) We've been giving Cache Tylenol to help him with his teething discomforts and his cold. Poor little guy was BEYOND exhaustion ALL DAY Saturday as we were trying to get home. We spent ALL of last Saturday in Sea-Tac airport. We flew in from Spokane at 7:35am. During our times of travel we have often said, "We will never fly stand-by again." After this last experience traveling stand-by, "we will NEVER fly stand-by again." It was awful. My poor baby like I said was beyond exhaustion from the "vacation", not having his "set schedule" along with the pain and discomforts of his first tooth coming in and a cold runny nose. Cache was crying, crying, crying the whole day. He was so sick of being in his car seat being shuttled around each terminal and gate as they changed as we were desperately trying to get home. We were all so miserable and tired from everything. Sad day, huh?!

There were only 4 stand-by flights out of Seattle to Denver that we could fly on that day. We were so concerned about "getting home", we did not even think to pack one of our suitcases as a carry-on just in case we needed it. Not very smart of us. The first plane out to Denver was at 6am, and revenue passengers were put on the next one at 12:25pm. The third plane at 3pm had room for stand-by passengers, but we couldn't get on because of weight and balance issues and the weather in Denver was rain/ thunderstorms. (Just like right now. :) It's been raining today and the rolling thunder just flickered our power out for a few moments.) Our last chance of getting home was the 6pm flight. We were both feeling extremely nervous knowing that flight was our last chance home and more so because we didn't have anything except Cache's diaper backpack. On the stand-by list we were passengers 13 and 14. There were only 12 stand-by seats open. We were blessed two people did not show up for the flight. We were the LAST stand-by passengers called to the ticket counter for the last 2 seats on the plane. By this time, I was desperate to get my baby home and I started to get all teary eyed when the agent told me the last two seats he had open were exit row seats where you can not sit with an infant. There was a couple of stand-by passengers who were ticketed before us and were waiting to get on the plane. The girl approached me because she noticed my quiet tears of distress and asked if there was anything she could do to help. She gladly heard our situation and traded me seats. I thanked her for her kindness and the blessing she helped us receive several times. I held Cache for half of the flight and Curt held him in the exit row the other half of the flight. Luckily, I got Cache to fall asleep while I held him. Curt was not so lucky with Cache screaming and crying the rest of the flight, because his ears hurt and he couldn't suck on his binky from his stuffy nose and cold. Ohhhh, what a day. We did not get home until midnight.

NEVER again will we fly stand-by.